The legacy of Mrs.Indira Gandhi, the former Prime Minister of India as flashed on the f.b.on Feb.10,2011.

Bishwa Nath Singh


Since last many days, I had a mind to present a write-up on the legacy of Our Country’s only women Prime Minister who had ruled over the country for over nearly fourteen years in all who had lived in the best of her time and worst of time too in her life who had laid down her life while she was holding the office of Prime Minister of India- Mrs. Indira Gandhi. One who had distinction to have her father as the first Prime Minister of India after Independence and later on succeeded by her son after her assassination. Let us have a glimpse on her legacy that she had left behind her!

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(Photo of Mrs. Indira Gandhi, the former Prime Minister of India)

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Bishwa Nath Singh :
Indira Gandhi who was born at Allahabad in U.P.Province of India on November 19.1917 as Indirā Priyadarśinī Gāndhī to Jawaharlal Nehru and Kamala Nehru had distinction to be the third Prime Minister of the Republic of India for thr...ee consecutive terms from January 24.1966 to March 24,1977 and for a fourth term from January 14,1980 to until her assassination on October 31, 1984 a total of duration of nearly fifteen years. She was Our Country India's only female prime minister to date who had established the record of the world's longest serving female Prime Minister of India that the world had witnessed so far. She was also the only Indian Prime Minister to have declared an emergency in order to rule by decree and the only Indian Prime Minister to have been imprisoned. She had lived in the best of time as well as the worst of time. Her Union Government faced major problems after her tremendous mandate of 1971 She had remained very popular as mass leader who strived hard to elevate poor and underprivileged to rise above poverty line by introducing Integrated Rural Development Program in the country and also many social welfare program with very populist slogans like “Eradicate Poverty” from the country. Garibi Hatao (Eradicate Poverty) was the theme for Gandhi's 1971 bid. The slogan and the proposed anti-poverty programs that came with it were designed to give Gandhi an independent national support, based on rural and urban poor. This allowed her to lead to popularity as a mass leader all over the country. She was daughter of India’s first Prime Minister after Independence Pandit Jawahar lal Nehru and grand daughter of Motilal Nehru ,the famous Barrister of his time and fore front leader of Our India’s Independence Movement of Pre-independence era. She had grown up in the midst of the struggle for independence in a highly political family. She started her Political career soon after she had finished her education .She was firstly elected as President of Allahabad City Congress Committee and later on , she was elected president of the youth wing of the Indian National Congress in 1956.Her husband Feroz Gandhi who was also a versatile Parliamentarian of his time ,had died in the year 1960 with whom she had tried her best to bring rapprochement in her strained relationship to normal at the fag end of her life and she had succeeded. Returning to India in 1941, she became involved in the Indian Independence movement. In the 1950s, she served her father unofficially as a personal assistant during his tenure as the first Prime Minister of India. After her father's death in 1964 she was appointed as a member of the Rajya Sabha (upper house) and became a member of Lal Bahadur Shastri's cabinet as Minister of Information and Broadcasting. The then Congress Party President K. Kamaraj was instrumental in making Indira Gandhi the Prime Minister after the sudden demise of Shastri. Gandhi soon showed an ability to win elections and outmaneuver opponents. She introduced more left-wing economic policies and promoted agricultural productivity. She led the nation as Prime Minister during the decisive victory in the 1971 war with Pakistan and creation of an independent Bangladesh. A period of instability led her to impose a state of emergency in 1975. In the beginning. of e days but entire their calculations were failed as she emerged as the most powerful Prime Minister of our country and a great statesman. She understood the importance of power and how to manipulate it better than most politicians.Under her stewardship India won a war against Pakistan for the liberation of Bangladesh in 1971.She ushered in the green revolution that ensured food security for India, nationalised banks in a move that cushioned India from the worst of the current global recession and abolished princely states.It was during her stint as Prime Minister that India joined the nuclear club and took big strides in the field of science and technology, but at the same time put in place draconian laws and elaborate red tape that hobbled the administration and the economy In international diplomacy she proved herself as an effective and strong leader who dared to take on the United StatesHer basic and primary strength lay in her ability to connect with the poor, which her critics dismissed as a tactical ploy. Even today, the congress leaders seek their election in her name. Many houses in India consider her very fondly as an incarnation of Goddess Durga who had liberated Bangladesh from Pakistan and worship her Photo as other deities. The Emergency was an event the Congress party tends to push under the carpet though it had brought a very bad name to Congress Party as whole and India in particular. The Indian electorate decisively voted Indira Gandhi out of power in 1977 in the first election after the Emergency that was clamped on June 26 1975, but re-elected her in 1980.It was definitely a sin that was committed by her but with the passage of time, the anger against emergency is gradually vanishing and is much less now that was seen during & soon after emergency. She who had returned to power in 1980 ensured great loyalty among her party members and this bred a culture of sycophancy that endures within the Congress party to this day. Her opponents had felt that she had drifted from her promise of democratic socialism to blatant didacticism and suppression of dissent. Tin Murti House where she lived and died has been turned into a memorial and draws up to massive visitors every day to pay to see that torn Sari she was putting on before she was assassinated soaked with strain of her blood. The tourists large in number pay their homage to this very strong and enterprising woman. As per economic surveys, when she had become the Prime Minister of India, 65% of the country's population was below the poverty line, and when her regime ended in 1984, this figure was 45%. During her rule, food production increased by 250%. The literacy also increased in India by 30%.She was a very dynamic leader and a great statesman. She was very popular in Russia and tried to ease bilateral relations with US ,Pak, Nepal & Sri Lanka. I admire and adore her towering personality. My father who had died in April 1975 was an ardent admirer of her and often he use to compare her with Rani Luxmi Bai .My father being a front runner champion of Cane Marketing Union and Co-operative movement in Bihar and ardent supporter of Panchayati Raj in the State was a great admirer of her.My father often use to compare her with Rani Luxmi Bai who was a great Patriot and warrior herself with difference that Rani Luxmi Bai had struggled for liberation of her own kingdom whereas Indira Gandhi had struggled for removal of Poverty from masses and to lead our country on the path of all round development. Now, I feel as how great prophesy and tributes of my father were that holds good even today after my father’s death in April 1985 almost twenty six years ago. Let me pay my respectful homage and floral tribute to her and pay our humble obeisance to her lotus feet!
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Anirudha Mohanta :
I never seen such a power hungry leader

Sd Sharma :
She lived for India and died for India. I respect her as a Prime Minister of India but also as a True leader of the Nation.

..Anirudha Mohanta :
she is nothing but a dictator

Sd Sharma :
It is Indira Gandhi’s Courage and Diplomacy who challenged the   7th Fleet of USA in Bay of Bengal and torn Pakistan into two parts and created a history.

Sd Sharma:
To rule a country like India for a long period of 15 years is not a job of a Sadhu. A ruler has to dictate his policies and decisions and get them done.

Sd Sharma :
So called leaders of Today, do not know and can not match the qualities of Leaders of yesterday. Rafi Ahmed Qidwai, one very important member of Nehru’s cabinet, when died, was in debt. He done too much for the country but ignored himself a...nd his family. Like this after the death of Shri Lal Bahadur Shastri’s death, he had no bank balance. When Indra Gandhi lost the election after emergency, she was asked to vacate the residence and she had no place to live. Then she requested the Govt. of Morarji Desai to allot her a residence on rent. She was allotted a bungallow (2 Safdarjung Road) on market value rent with a condition to provide a surety of a gazetted officer. I salute such selfless leaders.
Anirudha Mohanta :
sorry,it is our country we should not tolorate a dictator even for a moment

Bishwa Nath Singh :
As per economic surveys, when she had become the Prime Minister of India, 65% of the country's population was below the poverty line, and when her regime ended in 1984, this figure was 45%. During her rule, food production increased by 250%.... The literacy also increased in India by 30%.She was a very dynamic leader and a great statesman. She was very popular in Russia and tried to ease bilateral relations with US ,Pak, Nepal & Sri Lanka. I admire and adore her towering personality. My father who had died in April 1975 was an ardent admirer of her and often he use to compare her with Rani Luxmi Bai .My father being a front runner champion of Cane Marketing Union and Co-operative movement in Bihar and ardent supporter of Panchayati Raj in the State was a great admirer of her.My father often use to compare her with Rani Luxmi Bai who was a great Patriot and warrior herself with difference that Rani Luxmi Bai had struggled for liberation of her own kingdom whereas Indira Gandhi had struggled for removal of Poverty from masses and to lead our country on the path of all round development. Now, I feel as how great prophesy and tributes of my father were that holds good even today after my father’s death in April 1985 almost twenty six years ago.
.Anirudha Mohanta :
this can't be an excuse for a dictator to rule us again at any cost

Anand Prakash Singh :
she had a better understanding regarding the role as leader and dictator

Col Mehndiratta:
No Doubt she was an IRON lady wish we had miore like her to sort out the country

Sd Sharma :
Col. Sahib you are right. The country is need of a leader like her.

Mahendra Gaur :
she was a gud leader

Sunit Kumar :
Our main problem is that we lack leaders in India today, all we have are politicians. And so, our battered and staggering faith in leadership seeks refuge every now and then in the few examples we have (or so we believe), even if we have t...o ignore everything else, even if we've to blindfold our reasoning and even if we've to fool ourselves. And that's a basic necessity of human psyche. That's how religions are born and perpetuate too. It's our need to believe. So, whenever our faith in leadership flounders, our psyche takes us to the oasis of sense of greatness, where we've put some leaders we 'believe' to be true. But the fact is, no matter how much we bask in false (and manufactured) glory of Ms. Gandhi, she doesn't stand as a leader worthy of a revered place in any democracy. Because no matter how much we laud her for her glittering peripheral achievements, the dark truth at the centre isn't going to change - she tried to destroy the very soul of this country, democracy. The first, primary and foremost binding duty of any leader in any democracy is to uphold it, protect it and develop it. How iron-y your leadership is or how much development you do is secondary. The moment a leader fails in his primary duty, he loses the right to be a 'leader' in a democracy, so whatever he/she does after that has no meaning. For he stands disqualified by the very basic requirement for qualification. No matter how qualified a foreign resident is, we can't elect him to the office of PM/President/any public office because he doesn't have the basic qualification - he isn't a citizen of India. So, no matter how much development she did (allegedly), the truth is that she was the writer of the darkest chapter of Indian democracy, that she has smudged the history of Indian democracy indelibly with the most shameful kind of Emergency. And she may be anything, but she's definitely not the legatee of Nehru, a person who used to write anonymous letters in public asking them to keep him in check. In fact, she stands for Nehru's worst fear. She stands as his antithesis. If at all she has a legacy, it's of dynasty politics of which she was the proponent.

DrRanju Singh :
VERY INFORMATIVE ABOUT INDIRA GANDHI........

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f.b.
Feb.10,2011.